28 Sep 2004 | seor underpants said...

I make my own lunch. Usually it's leftovers from the night before. I doubt it's as fatty as a Chipolte's burrito. By the way, I heard Chipoltes is owned by McD's. If so, it kind of takes the surprise of these deadly burritos. Ba ba ba ba baaaa, I am lovin' it!

28 Sep 2004 | Darrel said...

another question...what healthy fast food menus have you found?

I'm finding a McD's cheeseburger, apple slices and yogurt parfait as a nice mix of a 'bit-o-grease' with something healthy.

28 Sep 2004 | cpalmieri said...

frozen bananas instead of ice cream.

Also, kinako (3rd from top). Great on ice cream, in smoothies, in place of peanut butter.

28 Sep 2004 | cpalmieri said...

sorry, link didn't work, try here or if that doesn't work.

http://www.eat-japan.com/food/glossary/beans.html

28 Sep 2004 | Sean said...

Speaking of burritos, I had a Breakfast Burrito made by Amy's Kitchen this morning.

I'm not quite sure what made it a breakfast burrito though, considering it was made from organic potatoes, tofu, black beans, vegetables and salsa wrapped in an organic flour tortilla. It's non-dairy, has no cholesterol, and it's pretty low in fat. And it's good!

You'd think I'd be a salesperson for these folks, but I'm not. Just someone who enjoyed a morning burrito.

28 Sep 2004 | Bryan Haggerty said...

I think what we need to realize is that vegetarian does not explicity mean healthy.

People seem to equate meat with restaurants such as McDonald's which in turn instills the idea of meat being unhealthy. Therefore the antithesis of meat is to go vegetarian meaning eating "healthy."

28 Sep 2004 | Don Schenck said...

Grandma Utz chips. Mmmmmm ... lard.

28 Sep 2004 | Don Schenck said...

I eat roasted, still-in-the-shell peanuts (unsalted) during the day as a snack.

I don't really "dig" anything healthy at the moment ... we try to keep things pretty healthy all the time. Had grilled salmon last night, for example, and I'm preparing asparagus, hardboiled eggs and priscutto tonight (from Emeril Live, last night).

28 Sep 2004 | One of several Steves said...

Where's the coverup? Restaurants are not obligated to provide nutritional information, and the information is readily available from third parties.

Anyone who's paid attention to nutritional information knows that vegetarian does not necessarily equal low-fat or low-calorie. The tortillas alone are a major source of the calories (about 350, in Chiptole's case), and of course cheese, guac and sour cream are going to add a lot of fat and calories.

This news strikes me as roughly as shocking as the sun coming up in the east this morning.

28 Sep 2004 | One of several Steves said...

Forgot to add: actually, one of the healthy options I have been enjoying is Chipotle. Get the burrito as a bowl instead. No tortilla, mix in the rice, beans, lettuce, go light on the cheese, no sour cream. Ends up being pretty balanced, reasonable amount of calories and makes a good lunch.

28 Sep 2004 | Josh Williams said...

You know what though... If you can actually finish an entire vegetarian burrito from Chipotl, I'd be a little concerned. That's one big vegan.

On that note, here's another hilarious one:

My wife works at Starbucks, and here in Texas, one of the "Atkin's Friendly" drinks that customers like to buy is a latte topped off with heavy whipping cream (instead of 2 percent milk).

Evidently, the heavy whipping cream is much lower in carbs.

"Yes, I'd like a Grande Heart Attack Mocha please..."

28 Sep 2004 | indi said...

I've been enjoying pita chips from Trader Joe's as a substitute for potato chips. Nice and crunchy without all the fat and salt.

28 Sep 2004 | Darrel said...

"You know what though... If you can actually finish an entire vegetarian burrito from Chipotl, I'd be a little concerned. That's one big vegan."

Ha! Yea, the Chipotle burrito is one of those things that you start devouring only to have your stomach catch up half way through it and make you think twice about finishing it. ;o)

28 Sep 2004 | sloan said...

I thought the burritos from Trader Joe's were bad with 600 or so calories! I'm not surprised though, the burritos at those places are HUGE! In the end, America is fat because of too many calories, add the fat and cholesterol issues and you've got a whole lot of pain down the line. I've read that obesity is the number one health cost in the US because of how many things being overweight effects. We were all told as kids to clean our plates right?!

28 Sep 2004 | Brad Hurley said...

Remember the old Moosewood Cookbook, the bible of vegetarians during the 1980s? Incredibly rich stuff, packed with cream, cheese, butter, whole milk, and tons of calories. It's true, vegetarian doesn't automatically mean healthy.

I think Mollie Katzen revised that book some years ago to cut out much of the fat, and in the meantime the Moosewood Cooperative (a separate group of authors from the Moosewood Restaurant) has also put out some really excellent cookbooks that are full of healthy vegetarian (and non-vegetarian) cuisine.

My favorite of these is the Moosewood Restaurant Cooks at Home, which is full of delicious and mostly healthy recipes, all of which take less than 1/2 hour to prepare. Every recipe I've cooked from this book (and I've cooked most of them) is a winner. I just made their Eggplant Mykonos last night: onions, garlic, eggplant, tomatoes, fennel seeds, dill, cooked in a little olive oil and served over couscous, topped with a little feta cheese. Fabulous.

Another favorite is the Recipes from a Kitchen Garden series by Renee Shepherd. These are brilliant, delicious, light, and easy recipes that use plenty of fresh vegetables.

28 Sep 2004 | Matthew Oliphant said...

I've been making a lot of quesadillas with chickpeas (or garbonzo beans for the so-inclined), seitan, cheese, spinach, and salsa on a whole wheat tortilla.

I like to know what goes in my food. And a lot of the ingredients I can choose from are all thanks to squarefoot gardening.

We haven't had a link to this site from Don in a while, so I thought I would help out. :P

28 Sep 2004 | Jason Beaird said...

My wife and I went to Chipolte shortly after they opened a franchise here in Gainesville and she got the worst case of food poisioning. She was sick for about 4 days. The culprit : Chicken Burrito. We haven't been back since. Salmonella anyone?

28 Sep 2004 | Paperhead said...

What healthy food (thats actually healthy) have you been digging lately?

A wide range of organic produce. In moderate quantities.

Why are all American meals actually enough for three people? Maybe I eat in the wrong places when I'm over ... but there's always far too much food on the plate.

28 Sep 2004 | Don Schenck said...

YEAH! Squarefoot Gardening RULES baby!

:-)

(I made homemade bruschetta topping last night from my own garden)

28 Sep 2004 | Don Schenck said...

My achilles heal isn't the food ... it's the Maker's Mark.

28 Sep 2004 | Matt said...

Why are all American meals actually enough for three people?

Amen. I'm an American who has done a lot of traveling abroad.

In Europe (Spain, Portugal, & France anyway), the "Super-sized" fast foods, super-sized fry, super-sized cola, etc., are the same size as an American medium.

When I worked at McDonald's many years ago, right as I was leaving that job they were talking about introducing a serving of french fries that would require an ENTIRE FRY BASKET. That's probably 2 pounds of french-fried potatoes. That's unbelievable.

America is so unbelievably overboard on food.

28 Sep 2004 | Don Schenck said...

"Calorie Coverup"????

Go to my blog and follow the link to Alton Brown's take on this.

28 Sep 2004 | greg said...

The Cooper Wellness Center has been on the scene for quite a while. I have a limited amount of exposure to them but their newsletter carries a healthy recipe every week. Most of their focus seems to be on portion control which is potentially at the root of our country's weight problem. Dr. Cooper is fairly well respected in the "wellness" field.

28 Sep 2004 | Darrel said...

Why are all American meals actually enough for three people? Maybe I eat in the wrong places when I'm over ... but there's always far too much food on the plate.

Because we're greedy.

Actually, the wife and I now 'save calories' by just ordering one meal when we go out...sometimes with a salad. Then the two of us plus our 3 year old share it.

28 Sep 2004 | indi said...

Don, thanks for the AB link. I ended up reading all the rants. :-)

28 Sep 2004 | Eamon said...

Healthy eatin's for suckers, though I do confess I eat at Subway three times a week: no cheese, no oil. I just like meat.

28 Sep 2004 | Andy said...

Fresh pineapple.

28 Sep 2004 | Andy said...

Sorry, I meant to say organic fresh pineapple, in season.

28 Sep 2004 | Andy said...

I liked Alton's rant. Great argument for legalizing drugs, too.

28 Sep 2004 | Darrel said...

Whoa...Alton's blog is painful to read. Lime green?

Anyways, I did make it down to this great line of his:

The fact that Dr. Phil has the number 1 cookbook on Amazon.com makes me want to end it all.

29 Sep 2004 | beto said...

Word has it that pineapple helps burn calories. And yes, the organic fresh, just-sliced-and-diced kind.

And I thought a well done burrito was a more or less balanced source of food... bummer.

Just because I can't help it...

Why are all American meals actually enough for three people?

Well.... "Super Size Me" anyone? ;)

29 Sep 2004 | Brad Hurley said...

Word has it that pineapple helps burn calories.

People say that about grapefruit too, but it's nonsense. I think celery is the only food that has been shown to require more calories to digest than it provides.

Yes, people lose weight on a grapefruit diet or a pineapple diet, but that's because they are either replacing other higher-calorie foods with grapefruit or pineapple, or else they being more careful about what they eat because they're on a diet.

To lose weight, you have to burn more calories than you consume, either by eating less or exercising more, or both. Because both of these things (eating less and exercising more) are hard to do for most people, there's a thriving market for shortcuts to that formula, most of which are snake oil.

29 Sep 2004 | Bogie said...

In the UK, Burger King have been printing nutritional information on the back of their tray liners for the last 5 months. They also just stopped salting their chips, removed their super-size meals, and introduced a new range of kids meals with carrot sticks and apples. Who says fast food outlets can't be ethical or healthy!

Going vegetarian is rarely a healthy option anyway. All that cheese, fry-ups, and carbohydrate laden fruit and veg make vegetarians the most unhealthy people around. Most of my veggie friends are overweight, and incessantly over-eat (something to do with their bodies crying out for protein).

Here I am, a healthy 29 year old omnivore with a love of Beef Wellington, and a cholesterol level of 4.6.

29 Sep 2004 | Don Schenck said...

I must be doing something right. 45 years old, resting pulse of 58, cholestrol level of 139, can still do 25 one-arm pushups (each arm 25, mind you).

Then again, last night for dinner I cooked up Emeril's recipe from Monday night: Roasted asparagus with garlic and pine nuts, a hard-boiled egg, and a few slices of proscuitto.

And I've discovered -- again, thanks to Emeril -- a great dessert: One (only one) frozen Oreo cookie. I get my "cold, sweet" dessert without indulging in 56 ounces of Breyers' best.

29 Sep 2004 | bryan said...

What the heck do you expect when you consume over a pound of food. Take some personal responsiblility for what you're putting in your body.

29 Sep 2004 | pineapple lover said...

Pineapple contains bromelain - an enzyme that helps break down proteins. Or so I have been told... I have never read that it helps you lose weight.

30 Sep 2004 | RR said...

The reason the Pineapple etc. type diets work is because of our programming. If there is only one type of food, you will actually eat less. If you have a buffet, you will eat more.

Wall Street Journal mentioned it in an article a while ago. Idea is if our ancestors just ate a whole bunch of meat and are full. Walking along they come upon some berries, and now you have room for that.

30 Sep 2004 | Chris from Scottsdale said...

I just enjoyed a Chicken Burrito with Sour Cream and Cheese. Even after reading all of this I still felt like it was a healthy lunch. Maybe it's the transparency of the food counter and that I can watch them put every ingredient in my burrito. I don't know. For a minute, I was thinking about skipping the sour cream and cheese but I didn't. Mmmm! Good!

01 Oct 2004 | Paperhead said...

Guardian article on diet - might interest some of you.

10 Oct 2004 | Danielle said...

It's quite obvious that excess is a huge problem in America, we're known to be obese, coming back from Europe after six weeks it was completely obvious 75%of the people in the airport are over weight. We have isles of crap to snack on, tons of fast food, tons of sugared up energy drinks, ColdStone icecream, we slap ketchup and mayo, and salt and butter on everything, and drink soda, and have Diet products, and low carb ads everywhere, the problem isn't carbs, it's lack of control and exercise, instead of drinking Coke drink water, instead of chips- carrots, stop eating out often and having bread before dinner, fried food is awful and food dressed in butter and salt is awful and so is dessert. If you want something sweet eat a piece of fruit for the love of god. Use oil and balsamic vinegar which has zero fat and low in cals and sugar, instead of ranch dressing, even italian is high in sodium which retains water and so is soy sauce. Alcohol is a big one to, so is Mexican. And you don't need to have large portions. I eat tuna salad sandwhichs for lunch with carrots and grapes, and snack on unsalted mixed nuts and dried apple. Watermelon is good for breakfeast instead of a bagel with cream cheese. I also make portabello, yellow peppers, and onion sandwhichs with lettauce, tomato, and goat cheese. Big salads, Veggie burgers, low-carb pasta, cucumber, avocado, and tomato sandwhichs with hummus and cheese are good to. Salmon and borocili is a healthy dinner, high in protein. It all tastes better then all this crap most people eat, I know I feel a lot better when I eat healthy then after Mexican, or fastfood.

30 Jan 2005 | compatelius said...

bocigalingus must be something funny.